Havisham: A Novel (16 page)

‘I’d have preferred…’

That my father hadn’t married the woman. I stopped myself saying it, but he could finish the remark for himself.

‘It’s about repairing divisions,’ he said, speaking slowly. ‘Before it’s too late. It’s about trying to complete my life – benignly. Benevolently. Making the past and the present consistent. Match up.’

I didn’t speak.

‘Come on, Catherine. Don’t let anything come between us now.’

I placed my hand on the counterpane. He placed his on top of mine. I stared at the marks on the skin that are called the brown flowers of death.

I felt the terrible strength in his hand. I realised he was quitting this life fast.

‘I wanted to do what is – truest.’

Through the window I could see Arthur down in the brewery yard, tightening the bit on his horse as a punishment for some misdemeanour.

‘I know the truth about Arthur,’ I said.

‘What’s that?’

I had spoken softly so that he might not hear, if he chose not to.

‘Nothing, father.’

‘I only wanted to do the right thing.’

*   *   *

I wished that I could hear from Sally again.

In her last letter to me she had said she thought Miss Stackpole would set off on her travels soon, with staff in tow.

I didn’t see why that precluded Sally from writing letters, unless Miss Stackpole was such a tyrant that she didn’t permit her servants enough time even to pen a brief note. What was the desirability of the job in that case?

But at least Sally must be having a taste of new places, and didn’t she deserve to? It was what her mother had wished for, and I supposed – very reluctantly, though – that I must concede the point.

*   *   *

In the last fortnight my father just shrank away.

He curled up in bed like a starved bird, with his face to the wall. He lay without moving, quite still.

If I touched his hand, he didn’t register the contact with as much as a shiver. He continued to keep his back turned on us all and his face staring into the plaster on the wall: here was a complete geography in its cracks and pittings, rivers and lakes and coastlines, an entire continent to quieten him.

Even the brewery, when I spoke of it by his bedside, that couldn’t draw him back. He’d had his fill.

T
WENTY
-
THREE

They wouldn’t grant a resting-place inside the cathedral, let alone a brass commemorative plate.

While my father was alive they had taken his money; but now they didn’t consider he justified any preferential treatment.

Born a commoner, he also died a commoner.

*   *   *

The modiste advised twenty yards of bombazine for a mourning gown (with long sleeves) and petticoat. (A father’s death called for nothing less.) Plus, nine yards of wildbore, for a black stuff German greatcoat. (Please bear in mind, Mademoiselle Havisham, the gown must have complete front fastening, and not a glimpse of petticoat.)

She suggested, since it was the done thing for first mourning, a black paper fan. And black calamanco shoes, even though it mightn’t be the latest fashion; but, Madame Morgan said, I wasn’t in London, and the choice was dignified.

*   *   *

I had requisitioned a tame priest, a man with little faith who suited very well.

Carriages collected in front of the church. The building was respectably filled. Starting to walk to my pew, with Arthur behind me, I caught a glimpse of a small commotion in the porch, a figure in mourning removing stirrups from his boots.

Who else?

I mouthed his name. ‘Charles, Charles.’

My spirits revived in an instant.

I glanced round. Arthur was watching the arrival too; I couldn’t determine his expression – suspicion, alarm. I tugged at his sleeve, it was time to begin.

*   *   *

Somehow the service passed, and as soon as I had reached the porch I had already forgotten whatever easy words the priest had spoken.

By the graveside I was aware only of not raising my eyes in the direction of the straggling ilex tree, because that was the one
he
was standing beside. I glanced round again at Arthur, who was watching the pallbearers’ efforts with disdain. (He hadn’t offered to be one of them; his past was quite enough of a burden to him, without making an example of himself to all and sundry.)

It was only then that I forgot not to look over at the shiny jagged ilex tree, and when I did I found Charles quietly smiling: to encourage me, I told myself, to assure me he understood the very charybdis of violent emotions this day was putting me through.

He had arrived wearing deep second mourning. A black silk hat with crepe about the crown and a knotted bow. Black buckles.

I had no reason to be surprised. Perhaps it was the sight of him in so much black that moved me to tears: living and breathing and intensely alive inside his impeccable sartorial restraints.

‘It was the death he would have wanted,’ someone had the effrontery to say in my hearing, between noisy mouthfuls of tea, as I walked about the room.

People’s faces were distorted as they tried to cram chicken legs and portions of pie and cake into their mouths. They drank quickly, before anyone else could drain the decanters.

They disgusted me. They had nothing to do with me.

I had
one
friend here, the truest, but where were the others who had called themselves my friends?

*   *   *

A letter of condolence arrived from Lady Chadwyck. But, it occurred to me on re-reading for the fifth or sixth time, the condolences might have been due to the sender.

– I feel this to be as great a Loss to myself. The Acquaintanceship of Mr Havisham occurred most propitiously for me, when my Trust in my fellow Mortals was deserting me. Your father had an undue Sensitivity – for a Man, I mean – as to the Wants of a Noblewoman (the which he insisted on calling me!) left prematurely widowed.

The letter rambled on – written beyond midnight, surely – and skirted round the precise nature of the relationship with the departed. Lady Chadwyck was still shocked by the news, and trying to put her own thoughts regarding the future into some (cryptic) order.

No letter arrived from any of the others. They would have heard, wouldn’t they? Or had Lady Chadwyck preferred to conceal the news from them for a while – until the mist of uncertainty obscuring, so to speak, the lawns and topiary of Durley Chase had cleared a little.

*   *   *

After the will had been read, my father’s lawyer took me outside into the Cherry Garden.

‘No surprises there, I dare say.’

‘If you wish to put it like that, Mr Snee. No, there weren’t.’

‘Mr Arthur doesn’t appear too pleased.’

He had just discovered that his inheritance was to be paid in annual instalments over ten years.

‘It may teach him virtues of economy,’ I said. But I doubted that very much.

Mr Snee was a small man, smaller than myself, with a face that might have been sharpened with a knife – and then treated with preserving vinegar. When my father first became acquainted with him, the lawyer was thought well of, but lean and hungry for success. Success soon came to him, and those clients he chose to retain were similarly equipped to do well.

My father had always been a little in awe of him; any meeting was preceded by an unusual degree of nervousness, even tension, in his manner.

‘So you knew what to expect, Miss Havisham?’

‘My father did explain to me.’

‘To you both?’

‘To us both, yes.’

His nose, when I inclined my head to the right and glanced a little down, looked sharp enough to cut my hand on. Then I realised that, without needing to turn
his
head, his eyes were swivelled sideways in their sockets, watching me.

I was embarrassed, and jumped in.

‘But it’s just
me
, is it, you want to speak to, Mr Snee?’

‘Since it concerns yourself, yes, I judged it best.’

*   *   *

And he explained. (Before, he said, I should hear about it some other way.)

My father, he began, had been lending money for several years to a certain beneficiary.

‘“Lending money”?’

‘On such favourable terms, some might have judged the exercise foolhardy.’

‘To whom?’

‘That is the nub.’

‘Someone connected with my stepmother?’

‘There is no connection.’

‘To whom, then?’

‘You can’t guess?’

‘Not at all.’

‘Really and truly?’

‘I
can’t
guess. Please, Mr Snee, tell me.’

Should I have been able to deduce the answer for myself?

‘Your patroness, no less.’

‘I
beg
your pardon –’

‘The good Lady Chadwyck herself.’

I knew immediately how often I would return in my mind to these moments, how my memories of Durley Chase would be endlessly complicated by the item of information I had just been given.

*   *   *

What it had amounted to was this: my father, for his own reasons which
he
judged best, had gained the amity of the Chadwycks for me by the only means he knew. By buying it with his tradesman’s ready money.

‘Why, though?’

‘You are a wealthy young woman, Miss Havisham.’

‘I can’t deny it.’

‘I expect you’ll have a wider circle now.’

‘Very probably. But –’

‘More friends than you ever knew you had.’

‘What does this –’

‘Your father craved – that isn’t too strong a word – he craved you should have an introduction to that world. He wished doors to open for you. You needed to receive a training first.’

And the Chadwycks had obliged. My father had made it worth their while to oblige. His association with Lady Charlotte had been mercenary from the outset.

‘And the understanding with her ladyship? You’d like that to continue? Or…?’

*   *   *

Why
not
continue with the arrangement? I could afford to do so. I wanted to prove to the Chadwycks, and also to myself, that I wasn’t petty. (And maybe I wanted to savour too a little of my own glory.)

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Thank you, Mr Snee.’

‘Have you seen any of them since?’

‘No.’

‘Or corresponded?’

I shrugged.

‘We need discuss it no further. And my discretion in the business is naturally guaranteed.’

I nodded my appreciation.

Such attentiveness, from one whose erstwhile reputation for quick thinking and lawyerly subtlety had always been so considerable. I was bound to be paying for it, and heavily, but I was a rich woman now.

*   *   *

I concluded that money was capable of doing good and also terrible things.

It had brought comfort to Lady Chadwyck, but it had perverted relationships, making them seem what they weren’t – and what they had no right to be.

I saw now, normally
they
would never have had the need to consort with the likes of me. Only my father’s money had persuaded the children, at their mother’s bidding, to entertain what must always have seemed to them an improbable friendship.

T
WENTY
-
FOUR

Sally, Sally.

Maybe she had other interests now, and other loyalties? I presumed her cousin
had
received and sent on my own letters. Could it be that Sally had left Miss Stackpole’s employment, or even been dismissed? If the latter, she would have felt embarrassed to write straight away; and time has a way of turning small procrastinations into habits. She might have felt it had got awkward, to take up where she’d left off, without the need of some explanation.

I was doing all I could to excuse Sally. Couldn’t she get just an inkling of it, and respond with the briefest of notes, merely to keep in touch with me? Whatever her reasons for not communicating, I was only too ready and willing to forgive her.

*   *   *

Arthur was coming in at all hours. He had meals prepared in the middle of the night. He let his dogs have the run of the house, his boots left the floors in a mess. Things had gone missing.

‘So, what is this? A house, or some private museum?’

‘You treat it like a staging-inn. And sometimes like a farmyard.’

I heard myself raising my voice at him. Which only set him smiling.

‘Don’t go upsetting yourself on my account –’

‘I’m not…’

‘Save yourself for someone who deserves you.’

His smile turned to rude, knowing laughter.

*   *   *

I received a letter from him.

‘
Most obediently, Charles.
’

It carried no address except ‘
London
’.

My Dear Catherine,

I’m afraid that my Affairs are likely to detain me awhile. As you know I travel up to Norwich and whatnot, & things are at a head at the moment wh. makes it difficult to get away. You need all yr. wits for Business, as you will appreciate, & there is the possibility I shall have to venture further afield, wh. will be unplanned if & when. But I do assure you of my continuing concern, if I might presume so, & my best regards for your Success & Welfare.

Even allowing for his stylistic lapses, I concluded that the letter had been hastily written. He was telling me as much as he wanted me to know.

I read the letter over dozens of times. I wished I could reply.

Like Goethe’s Werther, ‘
Today I put your letter to my lips and the contact of paper had me gritting my teeth
.’

*   *   *

I went into my father’s office and sat down. I leaned back in the chair, and felt too small for it. The proportions of my back to the chair back and my legs to the shank of the seat were wrong.

He had sat here for twenty-five or thirty years, since he had inherited the private room – next to the general Compting House – from his father. This had offered him his outlook on the world. The desk, the shelves of past ledgers, the view of the brewhouse, the roofs of the outhouses, a few trees, a church tower. With the window sash pushed up, he would have been able to hear snatches of gossip and tittle-tattle from downstairs, when the domestic staff had recourse to pass the brewery workers or the delivery men.